1. Field of the Disclosure
The disclosure relates to aircraft flight planning.
2. Introduction
A flight planning system is defined as a tool that will provide information about a specific flight to a pilot and other responsible or relevant parties. The primary output of any flight plan is the route-of-flight (using Highways in the Sky, for example), the time it will take to make the flight, and the fuel required to make the trip. The flight plan may include the actual amount of fuel to be consumed, plus the taxi fuel and any extra or reserve fuel.
Conventional flight planning systems typically generate thousands of output variables and each pilot, user, airline, etc. can typically choose which variables they want to see in the output. This process results in what is termed a customized flight plan.
Conventional flight planning systems have been restricted to using winds and temperatures aloft for computing times and fuel consumed. In this manner, conventional flight planning systems will look at various altitudes and determine based on winds and temperatures aloft, which route is the optimal to fly compared to any airway or waypoint flight restrictions. However, these systems do not have the ability to ingest or utilize any other real world environmental or tactical information. Moreover, since the wind and temperature data is forecast at different intervals throughout the day by several weather forecasters, inaccuracy and inconsistency may be prevalent.